A pedestrian walkway is a marked or physically separated route that keeps people on foot apart from forklift and vehicle traffic inside a warehouse, plant or yard.
Walkways range from painted floor lines to guardrail-protected aisles with gated crossings. Painted lines show where people should walk but do not stop a truck; barriers do, which places them higher in the hierarchy of controls. Crossing points are where the risk concentrates, so they are often fitted with barriers that make a pedestrian stop and look, mirrors, overhead warning lights or detection systems that warn at the crossing.
OSHA 29 CFR 1910.176(a) requires permanent aisles and passageways to be appropriately marked where mechanical handling equipment is used, and 1910.22 covers walking-working surfaces. OSHA does not prescribe a walkway color, so sites set a consistent internal color code and record it in the traffic management plan. Walkways work only if they follow the routes people actually need, so they should be checked against observed foot traffic. See warehouse pedestrian walkways.